


when mind and heart collide, where does love go?

by melonews



Category: (여자)아이들 | (G)I-DLE
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Basketball, F/F, Healing, Light Angst, Self-Acceptance, Self-Discovery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-28
Updated: 2020-11-28
Packaged: 2021-03-09 22:28:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,491
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27763759
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/melonews/pseuds/melonews
Summary: Yuqi loves basketball.Yuqi is fine.(Repetition is key.)(Sometimes she wonders—)
Relationships: Song Yuqi/Minnie Nicha Yontararak
Comments: 5
Kudos: 34





	when mind and heart collide, where does love go?

**Author's Note:**

  * For [chunghas](https://archiveofourown.org/users/chunghas/gifts).



> 201128
> 
> happy birthday love u!! 
> 
> i didn't know where i was going with it until basically the end. i swear i was trying to make this just gay fluff but. oh well! also sorry about some of the spacing i'm on my phone & i can't be fucked to change it
> 
> hope u guys like it!! stay safe this winter :]

If life was a movie, Yuqi would have won more awards than she could count. Because that’s what it all comes down to: her life is a stage and Yuqi is merely an actress waiting for her cues. 

She knows what to say to keep herself afloat, how to smile and act coy to keep the boys close (but not too close, never that close). Knows what to say to keep everybody laughing, how to keep coaches and professors alike enamoured with her, how to lie, every minute of every day because she’s not telling the truth, because Yuqi is an actress and everything is scripted and nothing matters and—

Nothing matters. 

Nothing matters but the push, the arch, the freefall down, the swish of the net proving she can do something, she is good at something. 

(There’s an echo of a ball smacking the pavement. It resonates like a heartbeat.) 

***

Yuqi loves basketball. 

Yuqi loves basketball, and her dad loves how much she loves basketball, and her coaches love how much she loves basketball, and colleges love it, and her peers love it, and Yuqi has to wonder if she loves it as much anymore. 

Shuhua tells her once about a psychological phenomenon called the overjustification effect. It states that offering an extrinsic reward for a behavior an individual is already willing to do can reduce their original intrinsic motivation for the behavior. Yuqi wonders if that’s beginning to happen with her. Because she loves basketball, she really does, but the heavy weight of everyone’s expectations of her on the court presses down on her shoulders until she can’t help but hate it. 

Yuqi loves basketball, she does, she just doesn’t know if she likes it all that much anymore. But that doesn’t matter, because Yuqi knows better than to let her emotions control her, especially when she doesn’t even know what she’s feeling. Plus, scholarship money. 

Yuqi loves basketball, she does, she does. 

***

There’s a girl she’s never seen before at the cafe she frequents before her Wednesday 10 AM. She’s to the side of the counter, leaning on it to chatter away happily to the staff. Miyeon, the girl at the counter, brightens once she notices Yuqi coming in, pushing the girl away and looking happy to have a reason to shoo her away. The girl pouts and starts whining, and Miyeon just rolls her eyes and bats at her head. 

“Yuqi-ah! My favorite customer,” Miyeon coos, smiling prettily. 

Yuqi scoffs. “That’s Shuhua, don’t lie.”    
  
Miyeon taps a manicured finger on her chin. “Nope, you’re definitely my favorite. Shushu is mean to me,” she says, pouting. “My little Yuqi-ah is nice and caring towards her favorite unnie, right?” The girl next to them gags and mimes throwing up in the tip jar. Miyeon ignores her. 

Yuqi steps closer. “Right. So unnie would be okay with gifting her favorite dongsaeng with a free iced mocha, right?” She flutters her eyelashes. 

Miyeon’s smile turns brittle and fake, and her eyes narrow. “Of course!” she says too cheerfully. “For my favorite,  lovely Yuqi-ah.” Yuqi smiles cheekily, and the girl next to them doesn’t stifle her laughter. Yuqi glances over and—

She’s extremely pretty and half of her dyed hair is tied up in with a ribbon and her eyes are sparkling with mirth as she looks at the two of them and Yuqi really thinks her smile is the prettiest thing she’s seen all day and—

Yuqi’s eyes flit to her bag, where there is a red pin and an orange pin right next to it and a white pin next to that and then a pink pin at the end and—

Yuqi’s heart stutters in her chest and the girl’s smile is  really so pretty and—

Yuqi takes her iced mocha and leaves. 

***

One time, when Yuqi couldn’t sleep and Shuhua had to leave for her 3 AM Starbucks shift in an hour, Yuqi stared up at the ceiling and told Shuhua that sometimes, always, every minute of every day, it feels like she’s drowning. 

Shuhua stayed quiet and let her speak into the quiet dark. And Yuqi did. She spilled her guts about everything she worried about, and the constant mantra of never being good enough that ran through her head like her own messed up soundtrack of life, and how sometimes Yuqi wanted everything to just  stop . 

The dark was quiet and forgiving and didn’t care that maybe Yuqi didn’t want to be the perfect star child anymore. The dark was full of Shuhua, who didn’t—couldn’t—say much, but she did sing an old Chinese lullaby that had Yuqi missing home so badly her eyes burned, and she had just drifted off when it was time for Shuhua to leave, so she just barely felt the press of lips against her forehead. 

Yuqi fell asleep and when Shuhua came back from work, the dark was gone and so was the conversation. 

***

The girl’s name is Minnie. She’s Miyeon’s new roommate and they met through singing. She’s Thai, knows multiple languages, and is funny, pretty, likeable, popular, pretty, pretty,  pretty—

Minnie is sweet and nice and apparently kicks ass at Monopoly, and Yuqi can feel that same gut-clenching feeling slither around her heart and wrap around and  clench and she’s pretty sure she’s panicking. 

Yuqi  knows she’s panicking when Shuhua wraps a cool hand around her wrist and bows them out of game night. Minnie wishes them a good night and safe travels and Yuqi’s breath is locked somewhere in her chest and Shuhua closes the door to the apartment, effectively cutting Minnie from view. 

They walk to the bus station in silence, and sit in silence, and walk back to the dorm in silence. Through it all Yuqi has her arms wrapped tightly around her waist, and Shuhua keeps her hand around Yuqi’s wrist and her other hand is holding the pepper spray. They make it back safe. 

They get into the dorm and Shuhua stares at Yuqi. Yuqi doesn’t know what she sees, but a second later, Shuhua is bringing Yuqi into a hug. “You okay?” Shuhua murmurs. 

Yuqi’s eyes burn. There’s something stuck in her throat and she works around it to whisper, “I’m fine.” Shuhua knows it’s a lie, Yuqi knows it’s a lie, but she lets it go and holds Yuqi even closer.

(Repetition is key, Yuqi tells herself. If you keep practicing one move over and over, it becomes muscle memory and then your body just knows how to do it, doesn’t even have to think. If you say one Korean word over and over again, eventually you get the pronunciation down and you know the word deep in your bones. If you say you’re fine, over and over again, then soon your body will believe you over the cuts stinging your skin and the sharp twinge in your ankles, and your mind will believe you, and soon it will become true.)

***

Basketball in college is a lot different than basketball in high school. 

  
For one thing, everyone there is actually good at the sport, wants to be better at the sport, and care about the sport, which was something severely lacking in Yuqi’s high school. Sure, they were a good team but not a lot of them cared about it past it being their winter activity. Yuqi cared, and look where that brought her. (Sometimes she wonders where she’d be—who she’d be, if Yuqi hadn’t cared at all.) 

And another thing, probably the most obvious, is when the boys from the basketball team watch them, there is no embarrassment. After all, why should there be? The girls know they deserve to be there and they don’t have time to giggle awkwardly, to allow the boys to ruin how they perform. There’s still the flirting, but it’s less of the girls giggling and throwing themselves around the boys, and more controlled and confident. Yuqi always stays on the outside when this happens, smiling just the right smile to make it look like she’s interested but she never gets too close. It gets worse at parties because there, they don’t have to stay focused on basketball. They can be free and flirt and get too close and Yuqi really hates parties. 

***

Yuqi loves basketball. 

(Sometimes she wonders—) 

Yuqi loves basketball, and her dad loves how much she loves basketball, and her coaches love how much she loves basketball, and colleges love it, and her peers love it, and Yuqi has to wonder—

(Sometimes she wonders where she’d be—)

Yuqi loves basketball, and her teammates tell her about the boys that look after her, with her sweaty face and defined arms and thighs, and those boys love how much Yuqi loves basketball, they tell her, with secret smiles, waiting for her to do something, and the blush is practiced at this point, and they’re still expecting, expecting, expecting—

(Sometimes she wonders  who  she’d be if—) 

Yuqi loves basketball, and she shows it, in how her sweat drenches her shirt, in how her ankles throb, in how the beating of the rubber into the gym floor is steadier than her heartbeat, in the dates she goes on, in the boys she pays attention to, and Yuqi loves basketball. 

(Sometimes—) 

Yuqi loves basketball because—

(Who would she be without it?) 

Yuqi loves—

(Would she be anything?) 

Yuqi—

(Sometimes she wonders—)   
  


(Sometimes—)   
  
(Sometimes—)   
  
Yuqi loves basketball. 

***

Shuhua asks her if she’s okay, as she’s icing away the latest twinge in her ankle. 

Yuqi smiles. “I’m fine.”   
  
(Repetition is key.) 

***

Yuqi sees Minnie a handful of times at the cafe where Miyeon works. She’s almost always there throughout Miyeon’s shift, and Yuqi begins to make small talk with her while Miyeon prepares her order. 

She’s nice. 

It makes something in her melt, a little, and settle, and Yuqi doesn’t know what to make of it, other than it’s warm. 

Minnie is nice, though, and sometimes buys Yuqi her coffee, so Yuqi supposes it can’t be bad. 

***

Yuqi loves basketball. 

Yuqi is fine. 

(Repetition is key.) 

***

Yuqi wants to die of embarrassment.    
  
Minnie is standing above her, that pretty smile resting on her face easily (like it’s carefree, like it’s not a mask, like it’s not something she has to fight to stay up, like it’s not a  struggle—). Her hand is hovering over Yuqi’s shoulder, where she had nudged the girl into waking up. Yuqi can feel the drying drool on her cheek and how her hair is falling out of its precarious messy bun, and Yuqi is going to  die of embarrassment. 

“Hi,” Minnie says, softly. Her smile widens further. She’s so  pretty , Yuqi thinks helplessly, and her voice is nice and pleasing, and Yuqi swears there’s nothing wrong with her. “You were here when I came in, and you’re still here, obviously—” And here, she laughs sheepishly, like she realized she was stating the obvious and it’s so cute, Yuqi can’t even fight back her responding smile. Minnie brightens in return and something in Yuqi melts. “Anyway, I was wondering if you wanted to come get some food with me.” Yuqi gestures half-heartedly to her splay of books. Minnie raises an eyebrow. “You need some energy, c’mon.”

She’s staring expectantly and Yuqi really likes her eyes, too—well she seems to be liking everything about the girl, and Yuqi’s realizing this is different from boys and the parties, and her eyes flit around and see her bag. 

“I really like your pins,” Yuqi blurts out before coloring scarlet. Minnie beams and offers her hand. Yuqi takes it and they walk out, arms swinging, to dinner. 

(Yuqi wonders—) 

It’s a start. 

***

Basketball gets (worse) more strenuous and Yuqi layers herself in ice and ice packs and cool towels until it’s her second skin. 

She ignores the looks Shuhua sends her way, biting her lip in concern. Shuhua has taken to hugging her more, and singing more old Chinese songs in the dark before her shift. She seems to let it be, though, whenever she doesn’t have to forcibly drag Yuqi to their weekly friend dinners at Soyeon’s place, and whenever Yuqi laughs a bit more and takes more part in their conversations. Yuqi doesn’t find it challenging, because Minnie is going to those things now, and the older girl makes Yuqi feel like molten lava is coursing through her veins and it’s so much more welcome than the seeping cold of the ice.

Things are looking up, but then Yuqi has a week straight of conditioning and the worst practices ever, and she doesn’t get a break, because as soon as she’s home, she has piles of homework, and she can’t go to the library for the off-chance she’ll see Minnie, because she has so much to do and she’s just so tired.

She sleeps through her alarm for class and Shuhua’s the one to wake her, back from her early morning shift. Groggy with sleep, Yuqi takes in her environment. Shuhua’s lips have indents where her teeth have been, there’s melted bags of ice around Yuqi’s bed and crumpled protein bar wrappers and papers strewn across the duvet and a clock blinking 11:37 AM in red at her. 

Yuqi bursts into tears. Shuhua’s arms are waiting for her. 

***

Yuqi loves basketball. 

Yuqi is—

(Repetition—) 

(Sometimes she wonders—)

*** 

Minnie wakes Yuqi up again when they’re both in the library. Mirth dances through her eyes, her pretty,  beautiful eyes, and Yuqi smiles sheepishly up at her. Minnie’s hand reaching out is like a lifebuoy thrown out to catch Yuqi before she can drown, and their subsequent milkshake outing is like the eye of the storm. 

***

Yuqi waits until it’s dark and Shuhua is gearing up for her next 3 AM shift. 

The dark is quiet and forgiving and full of Shuhua. 

Yuqi waits until it’s dark, and Shuhua waits for Yuqi. 

Yuqi clears her throat, licks her lips. “Shuhua, I think I’m—” 

***

Yuqi loves—

Yuqi is—

Yuqi—

(Sometimes she wonders—)

***

Yuqi doesn’t feel like she’s drowning anymore. Basketball is still basketball, but now—

A hand like a lifebuoy, a smile parting the fog in her mind, a food outing with warm hands and warm smiles and warm eyes and warm laughter and  warmth .

Chinese lullabies, thin arms wrapped tightly around her, a fleeting kiss on her forehead, quiet and forgiving and always steady, always constant, always  there . 

Basketball is still basketball, but now Yuqi has a hand reaching for her, a smile, Chinese lullabies, tight hugs—

***

(Sometimes she wonders—) 

***

A hand in hers and a brightening smile. Chinese lullabies and tight hugs. 

***

The next time Yuqi goes to the library, she doesn’t wait until she falls asleep. She seeks out Minnie herself, and when Yuqi finds her, she thrusts out her hand, reaching. It feels like a promise. Minnie’s smile warms her to the core and when she reaches up to take Yuqi’s hand, it’s binding. 


End file.
